Weary residents ordered to evacuate during heavy overnight rains returned home Wednesday as the threat of mudslides and flash flooding in Southern California’s wildfire burn areas eased.

All 1,500 people directed to leave their homes in the Orange County city of Yorba Linda were allowed back in, and no major flooding was reported in the hilly suburban communities that burned so dramatically earlier this month.

Santa Barbara County officials lifted evacuation orders for residents of about 2,200 homes. Many had fled for the second time in a month.

The first big Pacific storm of the season came ashore Tuesday, and on Wednesday it was still occasionally dropping rain heavy enough to trigger scattered flash flood warnings, but the region largely appeared to have avoided serious damage.

Several lanes of the Harbor (110) Freeway in Harbor Gateway were closed just before the start of the morning commute, authorities said.

Several vehicles became disabled in the flooded lanes of the southbound Harbor Freeway just north of the eastbound Artesia (91) Freeway about 1 a.m., said California Highway Patrol Officer Patrick Kimball.

There were scattered reports of small rock slides in Santa Barbara County, a slipping hillside in southern Orange County and a small mudflow in a canyon that burned last fall – but officials had feared much worse.

“The weather event is over, that doesn’t mean our work is over,” said William Boyer, spokesman for Santa Barbara County. “This is really just the beginning of the real rainy season for this area.”

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